In the article, ‘What we do and don’t know about the links between air pollution and coronavirus’, Lewis(2020) addressed the current pandemic that the global society is going through, as well as the current global pollution issue. Drawing the conclusion that air pollution is associated with coronavirus. It also includes Lewis's perspective on how he feels about other factors that affect the coronavirus. It also includes Lewis's perspective on how he feels about other factors that affect the coronavirus instead of just air pollution. For example, Lewis claims that there are some factors which create an opportunity for the virus to spread, for instance, population density. Applying the same method that they have used for the severe acute respiratory syndrome(SARS), and the data that they have collected in the past to use it to tackle coronavirus, this can be seen from "Such data is well-organised, traceable and has become easy to access." Based on the points elaborated in the article, it is hard not to think that both air pollution and coronavirus are linked. The author also mentioned population density and the global connection, and how this factor that contributes to coronavirus, but he does not further elaborate on it. Even with air pollution, the author did not share more about because the author did not explain in-depth, resulting in the readers is not well-informed.
One of the factors that the author failed to build on is air pollution. How air pollution is being measured is through the long-term average exposure to fine particulate matter, which is what we call PM2.5. In an article by Bon (2020), he mentioned that ‘The study found that even a small increase of 1 μg/m3 in PM2.5 levels were associated with an 8% increase in COVID-19-related fatality’. An example is an increase in fatality in a place where there is an increase in air pollution is Lombardy. In a report by Odone (2020)), it stated that " Lombardy is disproportionately impacted by COVID-19 related mortality, with approximately 53% of Italy’s COVID-19 deaths as of April 15, 2020". Based on the European Environmental Agency 2019, Lombardy was identified as one of the highly polluted areas in Italy due to its heavy industrialisation. Drawing from this information, a relationship between air pollution and the coronavirus can be observed. Hence, summarising that the severity of air pollution is correlated to the spread of coronavirus, linking back to my thesis on how air pollution is associated with coronavirus.
Another factor that the author failed to make a clear connection between SARS and coronavirus, is not emphasising on air pollution. Regarding air pollution, the data that has been collected from SARS has also been made readily available and researchers tend to associate how both of them are similar. Lau (2020) stated that "it is anticipated that a similar observation may be found in the COVID-19 pandemic, providing an indication of how air pollution may affect a person infected with COVID-19". In my opinion, from the article, we could tell that air pollution and coronavirus are related based in the article you could tell that there were details, the author also failed to expand on this topic.
Another factor that the author failed to build on is how global travel connections play a part in the spread of coronavirus, knowing that the travel ban has been implemented by different countries at a different point in time. This results in more inflected people entering and leaving countries with high tourist rate, causing the spread of the virus to increase in a different area and not be contained. According to an article by Kuhl (2020). "results suggest that the emerging pattern of the
COVID-19 outbreak closely followed global mobility patterns of air passenger travel" Without a doubt, if the travel ban could have been implemented earlier, preventing the spread of the coronavirus to different countries and region. For instances, if Singapore implemented a travel ban earlier, there might have a lesser community case. This proves the point on how the author failed to build on the point of the travel ban could have been one of the main factors.
Lastly, one of the factors the author did not explore much is population density. It is easy for coronavirus to spread in the highly populated area as the virus transmits from one person to another through saliva. For instances when people are talking, the water vapour in the saliva transmit from one person to the other. According to Bray, Gibson, & White (2020), "we found that the strongest predictors of the rate of deaths involving COVID-19 at the local authority level were population density and ethnicity." It should be noted that the impact of population density causes an impact on the growth of cases with coronavirus, crowding in one area will increase the chances that the virus will spread, that’s why affected patients are being isolated in their own wards, or in lockdown notice at home.
Altogether, knowing that air pollution and coronavirus do have a link, due to past the experience previous pandemic like SARS, as well as how there is an increase in fatality to coronavirus when there is an increase in air pollution. Not ruling out that there are many other factors that linked to coronavirus including global connection and population density.
One of the factors that the author failed to build on is air pollution. How air pollution is being measured is through the long-term average exposure to fine particulate matter, which is what we call PM2.5. In an article by Bon (2020), he mentioned that ‘The study found that even a small increase of 1 μg/m3 in PM2.5 levels were associated with an 8% increase in COVID-19-related fatality’. An example is an increase in fatality in a place where there is an increase in air pollution is Lombardy. In a report by Odone (2020)), it stated that " Lombardy is disproportionately impacted by COVID-19 related mortality, with approximately 53% of Italy’s COVID-19 deaths as of April 15, 2020". Based on the European Environmental Agency 2019, Lombardy was identified as one of the highly polluted areas in Italy due to its heavy industrialisation. Drawing from this information, a relationship between air pollution and the coronavirus can be observed. Hence, summarising that the severity of air pollution is correlated to the spread of coronavirus, linking back to my thesis on how air pollution is associated with coronavirus.
Another factor that the author failed to make a clear connection between SARS and coronavirus, is not emphasising on air pollution. Regarding air pollution, the data that has been collected from SARS has also been made readily available and researchers tend to associate how both of them are similar. Lau (2020) stated that "it is anticipated that a similar observation may be found in the COVID-19 pandemic, providing an indication of how air pollution may affect a person infected with COVID-19". In my opinion, from the article, we could tell that air pollution and coronavirus are related based in the article you could tell that there were details, the author also failed to expand on this topic.
Another factor that the author failed to build on is how global travel connections play a part in the spread of coronavirus, knowing that the travel ban has been implemented by different countries at a different point in time. This results in more inflected people entering and leaving countries with high tourist rate, causing the spread of the virus to increase in a different area and not be contained. According to an article by Kuhl (2020). "results suggest that the emerging pattern of the
COVID-19 outbreak closely followed global mobility patterns of air passenger travel" Without a doubt, if the travel ban could have been implemented earlier, preventing the spread of the coronavirus to different countries and region. For instances, if Singapore implemented a travel ban earlier, there might have a lesser community case. This proves the point on how the author failed to build on the point of the travel ban could have been one of the main factors.
Lastly, one of the factors the author did not explore much is population density. It is easy for coronavirus to spread in the highly populated area as the virus transmits from one person to another through saliva. For instances when people are talking, the water vapour in the saliva transmit from one person to the other. According to Bray, Gibson, & White (2020), "we found that the strongest predictors of the rate of deaths involving COVID-19 at the local authority level were population density and ethnicity." It should be noted that the impact of population density causes an impact on the growth of cases with coronavirus, crowding in one area will increase the chances that the virus will spread, that’s why affected patients are being isolated in their own wards, or in lockdown notice at home.
Altogether, knowing that air pollution and coronavirus do have a link, due to past the experience previous pandemic like SARS, as well as how there is an increase in fatality to coronavirus when there is an increase in air pollution. Not ruling out that there are many other factors that linked to coronavirus including global connection and population density.
I really appreciate the revision!
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